Event Report: Sentience Beyond the Human - Session Two

Event Title: Sentience Beyond the Human 多物種感知國際工作坊 (https://clab.org.tw/en/events/sentience-beyond-the-human/)
Date/Location: 2022/07/07, Taiwan Contemporary Culture Lab (C-LAB), Taipei 臺灣當代文化實驗場
Introduction
What does the non-human world have to say to us, and how
do we listen? Facing an uncertain future, one situated
within an Anthropocene, we must critically examine how we
situate ourselves with our earthly co-inhabitants. This
involves working with non-anthropocentric viewpoints, and
questioning our inherent assumptions of non-human
“sentience(s),” in terms of the political, historical, and
relational. This event report seeks to offer a succinct
account of four different (but interrelated) perspectives,
pointing to such more-than-human viewpoints. The talks,
presented at a workshop held at the Taiwan Contemporary
Culture Lab (C-Lab) 臺灣當代文化實驗場 engage with environmental
humanities, animal studies, media, international law,
sensory anthropology, and history. And, as the original
conference program rightly explains, explore ’pathways
toward ecological togetherness beyond the apocalyptic
imagination of Anthropocene futures.’ With this in mind,
this work will discuss the talks presented during the
latter half of the full-day workshop, introducing their
contents and conclusions. Additionally, this piece contains
a brief discussion section further summarizing and fleshing
out the points made above. Due to space considerations,
this report emphasizes some details over others. Therefore,
I invite readers to consult the above scholar’s published
works on the subject.
Jeffrey Nicolaisen (Taiwan ICCS, NYCU) – Why the Caged Bird Sings: Gallus gallus (the Common Chicken) Helps us to Rethink the Anthropocene
Environmental humanist Jeffrey Nicolaisen 倪杰 begins the
second half of the workshop with a critical discussion of
the concept of Anthropocene. He puts forward the central
guiding question of his talk, namely what is the story of
our current epoch? The speaker looks to nuance current
anthropocentric trajectories that underlie discussions of
environmental change by introducing the notion of a
Galluscene. Purported by the Anthropocene Working
Group (AWG), a special committee of the International
Commission of Stratigraphy (ICS), the Galluscene is marked
by a new stratigraphic layer composed of the remains of the
common chicken (Gallus gallus). As the presenter
explains, G. gallus, with a current population of 22.6
billion (2016), makes for a good candidate for such a
marker. This is aided by the rapid human-instigated changes
in the species since 1945, including human-directed
selection, and measurable changes in diet. Nicolaisen
highlights the connection between the story of our emerging
epoch, and the common chicken, the latter involved with a
multitude of aspects in modern history. This includes
capitalism, the rise of the sciences, colonialism, and the
neo-liberalization of the food industry. The agency of the
common chicken is thus contrasted with that of the AWG
Anthropocene, one that only recognizes human will.
As Nicolaisen highlights, the AWG suggests the agency of
humans on Earth through different bio-systems, such as the
Technosphere (“anthroposphere”). This refers to the sum
material output of the contemporary human enterprise,
reflecting a kind of ’intrinsic’ agency, being autonomous,
goal-oriented, and self-organizing. The Technosphere is a
result of several strata of theorizing on biospheric
development, evolving out of both teleological
(noösphere, ecozoic era) and non-teleological
(Gaia hypothesis) models. However, Nicolaisen
suggests we must move beyond simply human enterprises. He
points to the flourishing of different species assemblages,
such as G. gallus and humans, locked together in
co-evolution. The speaker contrasts the Galluscene with
anthropocentric exceptionalism, the latter driven by
human-centric ethics, and an emphasis on human agency. This
includes the limited scope of the Anthropocene that cannot
refer to all humans, due to only five countries producing
most of the world’s emissions. The Galluscene can,
conversely, provide a sense of multi-species
interdependence, pointing to bio-centric ethics, and an
understanding of the limits of human agency and human
technological drive.
Tobias Linné (Department of Communication and Media, Lund University) – The Emotional Labour of Farmed Animals
Critical Animal Studies and Media Studies scholar Tobias
Linné continues the theme of domesticated animals by
discussing the emotional labor of cows in Sweden. As
the speaker describes, emotional labor was developed to
study the management of emotions by workers in the service
industry. However, this category should be considered in
the study of animal workers as well, a notion absent from
broader discussions of labor. Linné suggests this has been
likened to domestic labor and other household work ’in the
shadows.’ The emotional labor of animals is notable in, for
example, service animals in health care and the
entertainment industry. This includes the visibility of
animals in social media and meme culture, which serve to
arouse emotional responses in the viewer. As the speaker
explains, social media is itself a medium powered by
emotions and directly benefiting from the role of animals.
With this in mind, the presenter discusses the above points
through a case study involving two social media accounts
set up by Swedish farmers. These forms of opinion building
in Swedish agriculture are becoming more visible, with
personal accounts posting about their work and the animals
they work with.
Situated within critical animal studies, Tobias Linné
seeks to understand how these farmers are presenting their
animals in media and what aspects are publicly disclosed. A
major narrative of these accounts is the close relationship
between the farmer and the natural world, termed here as
inter-species intimacy and care. In this sense, these
accounts emphasize the daily work of caring for these
animals, showcasing their quality of life, and the
human-animal relationships therein. Another theme is one
that seeks to blur the boundaries between human and
non-human. Animals are presented as having individual life
stories and personality traits, that result in a
superficial agency, history, and free will. Posts describe
cows being dressed up, and farmers speaking through the
animals, making it seem that the cow is communicating with
the viewer. While these accounts play with the boundaries
between human and animal, the cows lack full personhood,
being relegated as quasi-subjects, akin to pets. These
anthropomorphized depictions overwrite any real agency the
animal has, thus tacitly reinforcing human-animal
boundaries, downplaying any potential ethical conflicts on
farms. Through this, the presenter suggests that these cows
are performing emotional labor for the agricultural
industry by alleviating consumer anxieties. Ultimately
these are business accounts intended to bolster capital
accumulation, with the emotional qualities of cows
exploited as part of affective/emotional
capitalism.
Chung-Hsien Lee 李仲軒 (Institute of Asia and Pacific Studies, Taiwan Sun Yat-sen University) – Constructing A New Climate Regime in Court?
The third talk was presented by Legal scholar
Chung-Hsien Lee 李仲軒, which shared the results of current
investigations (and thoughts) into climate change
litigation. The speaker bases his discussion on the results
of the recent The State of the Netherlands vs. Urgenda
Foundation (2019), held as a paradigm shift in climate
change law. Here, the Supreme Court of the Netherlands
upheld previous findings that the State of the Netherlands
is legally obliged to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions.
This is by a minimum of 25 percent by the end of 2020. As
Lee explains, this decision is the first of its kind, in
which a state is ordered to develop a more robust climate
change agenda. The talk highlighted the problematic
language used in the proceedings, suggesting that the
conservative nature of legal institutions may hamper the
development of efficient environmental law. Lee suggests,
that these movements should also extend to current legal
discourses in climate change to involve the rights of
non-humans as well. In this regard, the law has to have
other roles to play in the age of the Anthropocene,
requiring a shift of present legal paradigms. These are
instigated by ever harsher climate realities, challenging
courts to confront issues beyond the scope of conventional
litigation.
As discussed above, the speaker argues that current
legal paradigms, (and the doctrines therein) constitute
obstacles to climate change mitigation. These involve, for
example, the political question doctrine, and the
standing to sue doctrine. The latter points to the
adversity of courts towards politically charged issues, and
the former to the legal requirements of a plaintiff to
proceed with legal action. The talk highlighted the
importance of the “perceived” neutrality of the court, one
that employs the power of science to determine causation.
Results must be value-free and in the binary, allowing for
no gray areas to make a fair judgment. The legal system is,
therefore, a culprit in maintaining an air of perfect
science and democracy, enabling people to view it as
entirely mechanical and predictable. However, as Lee
explains, when confronting issues related to climate
change, these structures are beginning to show their
limits. Alternative legal paradigms are needed to overcome
the limitations of relying only on scientific insights to
determine climate-related causation and the lack of
international political consensus. This includes
reassessing the assumed neutrality of court proceedings and
confronting biases within the legal system that actively
reshape facts (and values) in accordance there-in. In this
regard, the speaker highlights the importance of welcoming
alternative voices and sources, to create more adaptable
litigation when confronting the complexities of climate
change.
I-Yi Hsieh 謝一誼 (Taiwan ICCS, NYCU) – I Hear You: Animal Soul Statues in Taiwan
The closing talk of the workshop was held by
anthropologist I-Yi Hsieh 謝一誼, presenting an ethnographic
analysis of animal soul statues (chuhun bei 畜魂碑) in
Taiwan. Most of the statues in question were built and
associated with slaughterhouses during the Japanese
colonial era in Taiwan (1895-1945). The speaker argues that
these efforts point to popular recognition of the sentience
of non-human animals during this period. Slaughterhouses
are, in this sense, arenas where such recognition is forged
and maintained, provoked by hearing the cries of butchered
animals. The speaker juxtaposes these themes against the
early colonial efforts in Taiwan to develop civil hygiene
infrastructure, funded by regulated hog slaughter taxation.
She acknowledges the importance of recent drives within
environmental humanities for scholars to pursue approaches
that are attentive to such highly interrelated
(“entangled”) processes of life. Through the function of
’multispecies co-becoming,’ the speaker looks to articulate
the kinds of human-animal relations in colonial Taiwan, and
how the historical emergence of hog sentience can be used
to understand an urban ontology that still shapes how
human-animal relations are understood today. Within this,
the speaker stresses the importance of the place of
coloniality in the discussion of non-human sentiences, and
multispecies relationality within the Anthropocene.
Hsieh describes the origins of the statues, recounting
the development of public slaughterhouses that followed the
ban on private slaughter during early Japanese colonial
rule. The speaker moves on to describe the contents
inscribed on the statues, that point to the motivations for
erecting such commemorative monuments. As discussed above,
this involves reactions to ’hearing the porcine cries’ by
those living in sonic proximity to the slaughterhouses. The
butchering sessions usually started at 2-3 am, suggesting
that the sonic intensity of “invisible” howling hogs may
have lead to distinct sensory events. The novelty of public
slaughterhouse soundscapes in early colonial Taiwan thus
led to a new kind of multispecies relationality,
historically granting the possibility of ascribing
sentience to hogs. The speaker suggests that in the mutual
confrontation towards animal suffering, the colonial
government and its citizens were able to move toward
unifying distinct multispecies worlds. The presenter moves
to reflect on what it means to hear the cries of suffering
animals and the politics of such sensory engagement. Hsieh
then ties the above case with the contemporary meat
industry and calls for critical relational perspectives for
examining modern human-porcine ontologies.
Discussion
During the 20-minute discussion at the end of the
workshop, several key points were expanded upon, a few of
which I have summarized below. I-Yi Hsieh began this
section by further elaborating on the soul statues, sharing
their material qualities and provenance, being made of
larger three-meter stones, but without figurative
qualities. Today some of these statues are associated with
animal worship. Following this, Tobias Linné further
discussed the nature of social media use among Swedish
farmers, and how widespread this phenomenon is. Although
these are farms that have grown in recent years, part of
the motivation for social media use is to “give an air” of
a smaller scale. Linné’s talk sparked further reflections
on the anthropomorphizing of animals, with the presenter
pointing out the potential for critical anthropomorphism in
the context of representation. These discussions included
widening the concept of labor in animals beyond the
emotional to what, for example, Jeffrey Nicolaisen
highlighted as “metabolic labor.”
Lastly, a question was posed to the presenters which
sought to inquire on three different themes in the
workshop, namely personhood, agency, and the senses. And,
how these perspectives relate to and converge among the
different scholars’ research. Jeffrey Nicolaisen suggested
that to tie these three themes together, one needs to
consider welfare. As he points out, the legal concept of
“person” should not always be equated to “human,” with
personhood being affixed to a multitude of different
entities (e.g. corporations and organizations). Using
metabolic labor as an example, Nicolaisen proposes that
agency is not limited to simple goal-directed behavior.
Rather, this should involve adding to the notion of
subjectivity the possibility to feel, thus linking to the
senses. Through this process, we can slowly begin to
appreciate welfare, and thereafter begin to build a more
equitable notion of personhood. In the last 30 seconds,
Chung-Hsien Lee concludes the discussion by reflecting on
his approach utilizing systems theory, and how the above
categories can ultimately converge and be
reconciled.
Conclusion and Acknowledgments
This report sought to share notes on four talks
presented at C-Lab that discussed different stances on
themes revolved around notion of Anthropocene. While not
able to share all details of complex and multifaceted
projects, this work is nevertheless hoped to invite more
interest into the research of the above scholars. The
author of this work would like to thank Derek Sheridan
(Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica) for moderating
this part of the workshop, and Owen Raymond for his vital
technical assistance throughout the event. And lastly,
C-Lab and NYCU for their support in leading-edge Arts &
Humanities scholarship.
Disclaimer
All content above reflects the author’s reflections and
judgements, and should not be taken for an authoritative
account of the works of the above scholars